North Wollongong SLSC Series IIA 88

Australia's surf life saving clubs took to short-wheelbase Land Rovers in the 1950s and 1960s as the one vehicle that could tow a surf boat trailer over soft sand, run a reel and line along the beach and carry the patrol's gear between the clubhouse and the flags. North Wollongong SLSC, on the beach below the Illawarra escarpment, bought this Series IIA 88 hard top new early in 1963 and had the club's name signwritten on the doors.

The photograph, scanned from the original negative in the Illawarra Mercury Image Collection at Wollongong City Libraries (P34109, 'New car for North Wollongong SLSC'), was published in the Illawarra Mercury on 5 March 1963 and shows the club with its new Land Rover on the grass above the beach: a group of members, a rescue board and paddle on the roof and the spare on the bonnet. The print is black and white, so the body is modelled in Limestone, the cream-white Land Rover offered through the period, with the club lettering on the doors and a simplified emblem where the photograph shows a badge too coarse to read.

The door emblem follows the club's logo supplied at review: a red lifebuoy with navy S L S C patches around the red NW monogram, Nth Wollongong lettered above and S.L.S.C. below.